Dan Minette wrote:
>Kat, I find it amazing that most of the people on the list do not take the
>totality of what John has said in responding to him. He deliberately took a
>lower paying job in government because, IIRC, he felt an obligation to serve
>people, felt like he could do some good, and enjoyed the work there more
>than work in the private sector.
>
>Given that, one should assume that John has a broader idea of cost-benefit
>analysis. Let me make some guesses about him, and see if I'm right....
I am well-reproved. Thank you. Getting a bit vicious these days,
perhaps....
Okay, first, I don't think- and I tried to make this at least a bit
clear, but didn't spell it out, which I should have- that John is someone
who only thinks in terms of money. If I did, I wouldn't bother talking to
him at all.
I do think that when he says cost-benefit analysis, he means something
far greater than just assigning a value to everything that comes along.
But I also think he uses it as something of a catch-phrase to pull all us
impractical environmentalist whackos up short. As someone who's had her
catch-phrases thoroughly blasted in the past I feel obliged to return the
favor.
<grin>
More seriously, really, I'm not trying to diss John (this time). I'm
trying to make him think about a process that he uses because I'm not
sure he's thought about it enough. That's all. Tact is not exactly my
middle name, in case anybody's failed to notice, and with JDG especially
I tend to play hardball because he seems to be the same way. If I go too
far somebody bop me one with a chair and I will go quietly horizontal for
a while. <grin>
Kat Feete
------
I would like to apologise to the relatives
of the fan who gave me 29 books to sign in
Odyssey 7, Manchester. I'm a little twitchy
towards the end of a day of signing and did
not mean to kill and eat him.
- Terry Pratchett
